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After a year of careful preparation, Olivia Chow is finally ready to enter what is fast shaping up as a tough race to become Toronto’s next mayor.

Chow is fully expected to file her formal nomination papers at city hall during the week of March 17 and will immediately release her complete campaign platform, which is being described as “ambitious, surprising and bold.”

“We could go tonight, we’re that ready,” one senior campaign organizer said for Chow, the only progressive left candidate on the ballot.

In recent days and weeks, Chow has finalized her senior campaign team, appointed a top political organizer to head a 40-person fundraising group, selected a senior communications strategist and speechwriter, settled the main points of her “bulletproof” election platform complete with financial data, and approved a strategy on how to respond to the wave of attacks likely to be unleashed on her by current mayor Rob Ford.

The team has also selected a campaign headquarters and has built an extensive volunteer, grassroots network in many of the key suburban neighbourhoods where she must fare well in the Oct. 27 election in order to win.

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“All that we need to launch is for Olivia to give us the official go-ahead word,” the senior organizer said.

Chow, currently the NDP MP for the downtown riding of Trinty-Spadina and a former city councillor, has been the front-runner in virtually every public opinion poll over the past year.

Her decision to delay her entry until late March was a calculated move aimed at giving a bit of time for Ford, Tory, Stintz and Soknacki — all seen as conservative-leaning candidates — to start attacking each other instead of focusing strictly on her.

In 2010, Ford didn’t enter the race until March 25. In that election, Ford trailed early front-runner George Smitherman in every poll until July, when he finally surpassed the former Ontario Liberal minister. Once in the lead, Ford never looked back.

On the fundraising side, Flavio Volpe, son of former federal Liberal cabinet minister Joe Volpe, will play a huge role. He was the long-time chief of staff to Sandra Pupatello when she was the Ontario economic development minister and chaired her fundraising team during her 2013 Ontario Liberal leadership campaign.

Chow expects to spend the full legal limit of about $1.5 million during the campaign, so her fundraising team has its work cut out for itself.

On communications and speech writing, Lloyd Rang will assume a leading position. Rang was director of writing and new media and chief speechwriter for former premier Dalton McGuinty from 2008 until 2012.

At the outset of the campaign, Chow will unveil her platform, which she believes will appeal to her progressive core, which she sees as women who, disgusted by Ford and his scandals, want a change and “people who are struggling.”

Pointedly, her campaign organizers note that neither Tory nor Stintz provided their complete platforms when they launched their formal campaigns last week.

Also, Chow will emphasize her personal story: growing up, watching every penny, learning the value of a dollar the hard way. She will stress that she served five straight years on former mayor Mel Lastman’s budget committee, during which time the city had balanced budgets.

“She will let voters know that she will treat every dollar wisely,” one Chow strategist said.

Chow is already being attacked by Ford and his supporters as a downtown “tax-and-spend” NDPer who will fight business progress and drive companies away from Toronto.

That’s why her team will focus on playing up her poor roots and her knowing the value of a dollar. Chow “will make the Fords pay for every time they raise the tax-and-spend smear,” the strategist said. “She will say she worked her way up, she struggled, while Rob Ford grew in a life of privilege as the son of a millionaire.”

For all of her planning, Chow will face a tough fight — maybe even an uphill one — in trying to win the mayor’s seat.

She has led in most polls since last year, but the latest poll has her tied with Ford and holding only a narrow edge over Tory.

And as much as she might deny it, Chow is almost as much as a polarizing figure in this campaign as Ford. Many middle-class voters, especially in areas such as the north Yonge corridor, violently oppose the thought of her as mayor, fearing she would return the city to the freer-spending days of David Miller.

In addition, even though she is spending most weekends meeting community groups and attending ethnic events in Scarborough, North York and Etobicoke, her roots and her passions are downtown. She must try hard to overcome a perception that she is out of touch with voters in the suburbs.

Indeed, victory for Chow will be a challenge.

But at least with her formal entry coming within days, the race will at last begin for real.

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